Heretofore
by Stolen Childe
Summary: Reflections of our favourite bottled-blond vampire. Set during 'Not Fade Away.' Please read and review!


**Title**: Heretofore 

**Author**: Stolen Childe 

**Disclaimer**: I do not own the characters of the_ Angel_ television series. They belong to people with names. 

**Warnings:** angst, slashy subtext if you're looking for it, cursing 

**Ratings**: PG 

**Pairings:** None unless you look 

**Spoilers:** Season five after_ Destiny_ I believe. 

**Feedback:** [_puppy eyes_] Pwease? 

**Author's Notes:** Okay, this started out as something random I was writing, usually the ones where it's about Spike (ie 'Absolutely Perfect') are.I never intended for it to take place during _Not Fade Away_ or for it to amount to anything really. Like I mentioned above [_points_] there aren't any real pairings in this unless you are a hopeless slasher like myself. But really it's more A/S friendship than anything. So please enjoy! 

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He had tried to hold true to at least some semblance of his mortal life during the early years. During long, sleepless, summer days, he would lock himself in his own tiny study. He would take up his wooden fountain pen and bottle of acrid smelling ink, sit before musty paper and write. Or try to write. Sometimes inspiration came, other times it vanished. Most were filled with dark rich eyes, with a feminine or masculine tilt, depending on his mood. Sometimes the words would come and sometimes they would disappear, flit away like hummingbirds. But always they ended the same. He would put down his pen in defeat and sit slumped, pained in his chair. Arms would soon find their ways around his shoulder, a nose would be buried in his neck and fingers would tangle in his hair. 

"Sweet Childe. Haven't ye learned to let it go yet?" the Irish lilt would soothe his nerves and he would surrender, "Yer me babe Will. I willna have you locked away up here. There are so many better things dat you and I could be doin' together." 

"If I have not this to cling to, then what?" his eyes would be pleading, and that large hand would cup his cheek. 

"Ye have me Will." 

But those of course were the early years. They were the years before the love and tenderness vanished. The years before young William the Bloody came into his own and found out how handy railroad spikes could be. The years before a vile feud over a slip of a girl. The years before soddin' gypsies, bloody souls and long before little, bitchy, poxy slayers. The years before the military and their pretty stun-guns. The years before chips and loves that would never be returned. The years before more effin' souls and before madness. Before burning up in the sun. 

He still found though that those days were gradually slipping away. That towers of chrome and glass made demons meet and mesh. Camaraderie was found over shared angst and the shared love of another slip of a girl. In the old country bonds were formed. This made his fingers itch again for the oddly familiar weight of a wooden fountain pen. The acrid scent of ink and the soft texture of thick parchment. This made him once more want to share his words with the world before it collapsed around him in fire and ash. It made him long for strong arms, a cool touch and a soft Irish lilt. All things long gone. 

For Spike was not a fledge anymore, he couldn't run to daddy when things got tough. And things were at their toughest. The world was ending in less than twenty-four hours. The glass and chrome tower, where old friendships had been rekindled would tumble down around them. Faintly he wondered, as he took the small stage, if that rekindled closeness would crumble right along with it. For that tower in the sky represented so much. 

He had been nothing in a building full of nothing haunting the halls as a spirit-that-shan't-have-been. He had been a pillar, surrounded by pillars when the life of a precious, sweet child had been taken. He had been a confidant amongst walls with ears. And now, perhaps now he was the building itself. Reformed sire's love personified, soon only to tumble to rubble. His last thought, before his mind focused solely on the stanzas, was that perhaps, just perhaps he should write this down. Another meaningless string of incomprehensible words. Perhaps, just perhaps, before the world crumbled to tinder in a sea of ash and whitened coal. 

End 


End file.
